Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale (SGCBS)

Abstract

The Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale (SGCBS) is a comprehensive, 25-item multidimensional psychometric instrument developed by Gary Mortimer, Ursula S. Bougoure, and Syed Fazal-E-Hasan (2015) to conceptualize, operationalize, and measure the distinct psychological and motivational drivers underpinning self-gifting consumer behaviour (SGCB). Self-gifting represents a specialized form of consumer behavior characterized by the intentional acquisition of products, services, or experiential offerings intended as personally symbolic gifts to oneself. Grounded in the systematic scale development paradigm articulated by Churchill (1979), the SGCBS establishes a robust seven-factor architecture that captures both hedonic gratification and complex affect-regulatory mechanisms. These seven dimensions comprise: (1) Self-Gift (SG) Reward, (2) SG Personal Disappointment, (3) SG Celebratory, (4) SG Therapeutic Motivation, (5) SG Negative Mood Reduction, (6) SG Positive Mood Reinforcement, and (7) SG Hedonic. A pioneering contribution of this scale is the empirical delineation of Personal Disappointment as an independent construct distinct from generalized, lingering negative mood states, isolating acute cognitive-affective coping responses following personal failure. Administered via a standardized 7-point Likert scale, the instrument was validated across two independent, non-student consumer samples utilizing rigorous exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and structural equation modeling (SEM). The scale exhibits exemplary psychometric properties, with subscale Cronbach's alpha coefficients ranging from .836 to .964, high composite reliability, established average variance extracted (AVE), and demonstrated convergent, discriminant, and nomological validity. The SGCBS serves as an essential measurement tool in consumer psychology, behavioral economics, and clinical investigations of retail therapy and compensatory consumption.

Keywords

Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour, SGCBS, Compensatory Consumption, Consumer Psychology, Affect Regulation, Retail Therapy, Psychometrics, Scale Validation, Hedonic Motivation, Mood Repair

Authors

The Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale was developed and empirically validated by a team of researchers in marketing and consumer psychology:

• Gary Mortimer — Professor of Marketing and Consumer Behaviour, QUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology (Brisbane, Australia). Renowned for research in consumer psychology, retail marketing, and food retailing.
• Ursula S. Bougoure — Associate Professor and Marketing Researcher, affiliated with the QUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology (Brisbane, Australia). Specializes in consumer decision-making and services marketing.
• Syed Fazal-E-Hasan — Senior Lecturer in Marketing, Department of Marketing, Australian Catholic University (ACU) / QUT Business School (Australia). Focuses on quantitative marketing analytics, structural equation modeling, and consumer wellbeing.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale (SGCBS) is to provide an empirically validated, theoretically rigorous, and psychometrically sound diagnostic instrument capable of assessing the diverse motivations that drive individuals to purchase symbolic gifts for themselves. Prior to the development of the SGCBS, the conceptualization of self-gifting in marketing and behavioral economics relied predominantly on exploratory qualitative inquiries, such as the seminal descriptive foundations laid by Mick and DeMoss (1990a, 1990b), or fragmented single-dimension scales that conflated self-gifting with impulsive purchasing, compulsive buying disorder, or general hedonism.

The SGCBS addresses critical gaps in both theoretical and applied research:

• Delineation from Unplanned and Impulsive Consumption: Self-gifting requires a distinct cognitive framing where the item or experience is explicitly labeled as a “gift to the self,” often accompanied by self-dialogue, justification, and symbolic meaning. The SGCBS operationalizes these purposeful psychological dimensions.
• Separation of Acute Affective Repair from Chronic Mood Management: A principal motivation for the creation of the SGCBS was the empirical clarification of negative affect. The scale systematically bifurcates generalized, slower-moving negative mood states (e.g., pervasive sadness or stress) from immediate, event-driven cognitive letdowns (captured via the novel Personal Disappointment dimension).
• Quantification of Dual Affect Regulation: The scale measures both compensatory (negative-to-neutral or negative-to-positive) mood management and celebratory or hedonic amplification (positive-to-enhanced positive) affect regulation strategies.
• Applications in Behavioral Research and Retail Strategy: For academic researchers, the SGCBS provides a standardized measurement model to investigate how personality traits, stress levels, cultural values, and economic pressures influence self-directed consumption. For clinical and consumer psychologists, it offers a diagnostic lens into compensatory coping mechanisms and retail therapy tendencies. For commercial practitioners, it enables granular market segmentation based on consumer emotional states and motivational orientations.

Psychological Construct

Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour (SGCB) is defined as a complex, self-directed consumption phenomenon wherein an individual selects, purchases, and allocates a product, service, or sensory experience as a symbolic gift to themselves. Unlike mundane personal purchases driven purely by utilitarian necessity, self-gifting involves conscious self-attribution, emotional framing, and context-dependent psychological rationalizations. The SGCBS decomposes this overarching construct into seven distinct, correlated latent dimensions:

1. SG Reward

This dimension reflects self-regulatory reinforcement mechanisms wherein consumers actively award themselves tangible or experiential treats conditional upon goal attainment, task completion, or hard work. Drawing from behavioral learning theory and operant conditioning principles, consumers utilize self-rewards to mark personal milestones and validate their self-efficacy. For example, a professional might purchase a high-end watch or a weekend vacation specifically to commemorate the successful defense of a project or the endurance of arduous labor.

2. SG Personal Disappointment

Introduced to psychometric literature by Mortimer, Bougoure, and Fazal-E-Hasan (2015), this dimension captures immediate, event-contingent self-gifting triggered by personal failure, unmet expectations, or thwarted objectives. Unlike generalized negative moods that may emerge without an identifiable focal trigger, personal disappointment represents an acute cognitive attribution of falling short of one's standards (e.g., failing an exam, being passed over for a promotion, or experiencing a personal relationship setback). Self-gifting in this context functions as an immediate self-consolation mechanism to restore perceived self-worth.

3. SG Celebratory

The celebratory dimension represents normative, ritualistic, or temporal self-gifting aligned with recognized festive milestones, holidays, birthdays, or cultural celebrations. Rooted in traditional gift-giving anthropology, individuals incorporate themselves into their own gift-giving circles during festive seasons (e.g., purchasing oneself a holiday treat during Christmas or marking a personal birthday). This dimension captures the internalization of social celebration rituals into solitary consumer practices.

4. SG Therapeutic Motivation

Therapeutic motivation assesses the explicit psychological reliance on consumption as a structured coping intervention to alleviate deep-seated emotional pain, acute distress, or significant life stressors. Rooted in clinical paradigms of retail therapy, this dimension measures the belief that the physical act of acquiring an item operates as emotional medicine, providing an experiential refuge and psychological solace during turbulent personal periods.

5. SG Negative Mood Reduction

Distinct from both acute personal disappointment and deep therapeutic intervention, negative mood reduction measures the everyday, homeostatic management of low-arousal or persistent unpleasant affective states (e.g., general fatigue, diffuse sadness, irritability, or low energy). Here, self-gifting is deployed as an affect-regulatory instrument designed to lift spirits, alter subjective emotional baselines, and escape unpleasant psychological states through pleasant distraction and tactile acquisition.

6. SG Positive Mood Reinforcement

This subscale evaluates the proactive amplification and sustainment of pre-existing positive affective states. Rather than seeking mood repair, consumers with high positive mood reinforcement motivations engage in self-gifting to maintain, celebrate, or extend feelings of joy, exuberance, and optimism. The self-gift serves as an affective anchor that memorializes and prolongs a positive psychological state, turning an ordinary good day into an elevated, memorable experience.

7. SG Hedonic

The hedonic dimension measures consumption driven by the pursuit of pure sensory pleasure, intrinsic excitement, novelty, and aesthetic gratification. Divorced from specific performance achievements (Reward) or emotional repair (Therapeutic / Mood Reduction), hedonic self-gifting represents uninhibited self-indulgence. Consumers engage in this behavior because the shopping journey and item ownership are intrinsically delightful, fun, stimulating, and sensory-rich.

Theoretical Framework

The conceptual architecture of the SGCBS synthesizes foundational theories across consumer behavior, clinical psychology, and cognitive motivation:

Affect Regulation Theory

The primary theoretical bedrock of the SGCBS is Affect Regulation Theory (Gross, 1998; Larsen, 2000). According to this framework, individuals actively monitor, evaluate, and modify their emotional reactions to maintain optimal psychological equilibrium. Within the SGCBS, affect regulation is bifurcated into two dominant motivational trajectories:

• Affect Repair (Compensatory Regulation): Represented by SG Personal Disappointment, SG Therapeutic Motivation, and SG Negative Mood Reduction. When individuals experience psychological disequilibrium—whether caused by ego threats, chronic stress, or negative emotional valences—consumption is strategically utilized to restore affective homeostasis and alleviate psychological distress.
• Affect Amplification (Mood Maintenance / Up-Regulation): Represented by SG Positive Mood Reinforcement and SG Hedonic. Consumers deliberately utilize the symbolic and sensory attributes of gifts to boost, savor, and extend positive affect, demonstrating that self-gifting is equally a tool of emotional enrichment.

Compensatory Consumption Theory

The scale draws heavily upon Compensatory Consumption Theory (Gronmo, 1988; Rucker & Galinsky, 2008), which posits that individuals utilize consumer goods to remediate perceived self-discrepancies, psychological deficits, or threatened identities. When personal failure or emotional isolation threatens self-esteem, self-gifting operates as a restorative mechanism through which individuals provide themselves with symbolic affirmation, comfort, and tangible validation.

Self-Reinforcement and Operant Conditioning

Grounded in Albert Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory and behavioral self-reinforcement paradigms (Bandura, 1976), the SG Reward dimension conceptualizes self-gifting as an internalized operant conditioning mechanism. Consumers establish contingent performance standards; upon fulfilling these internal criteria, they administer self-rewards to reinforce desirable behaviors, foster self-efficacy, and celebrate hard-earned competence.

Churchill's Psychometric Development Paradigm

Methodologically, the construction of the SGCBS strictly adheres to Churchill's (1979) classic paradigm for developing valid and reliable marketing measures. This rigorous multi-stage procedure entailed qualitative domain specification, initial pool item generation, content and face validity screening by expert panels, pilot testing, item purification through exploratory factor analysis, and subsequent structural equation modeling across distinct, non-overlapping empirical samples.

Validity

The validity of the SGCBS was established by Mortimer et al. (2015) across two distinct empirical consumer studies utilizing independent consumer panels:

Content and Face Validity

Content validity was ensured via an exhaustive review of qualitative and quantitative self-gifting literature, combined with exploratory interviews. An initial pool of 48 candidate items was evaluated by a panel of expert judges specializing in psychometrics and consumer behavior. Items exhibiting ambiguous phrasing, conceptual overlap, or poor domain representation were eliminated, leaving 31 items for initial empirical purification.

Construct and Convergent Validity

Convergent validity demonstrates that items within each latent construct share a high proportion of common variance. In the final confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) across a primary sample ($N = 407$) and a validation sample ($N = 405$):

• All 25 standardized factor loadings ($lambda$) were statistically significant ($p < .001$) and exceeded the recognized threshold of .70, ranging from .73 to .96.
• The Average Variance Extracted (AVE) for all seven latent constructs substantially surpassed the recommended .50 cutoff criterion (Fornell & Larcker, 1981), demonstrating that variance captured by the construct exceeded measurement error: SG Reward ($ ext{AVE} = .78$), SG Personal Disappointment ($ ext{AVE} = .82$), SG Celebratory ($ ext{AVE} = .72$), SG Therapeutic Motivation ($ ext{AVE} = .87$), SG Negative Mood Reduction ($ ext{AVE} = .89$), SG Positive Mood Reinforcement ($ ext{AVE} = .74$), and SG Hedonic ($ ext{AVE} = .57$).
• Composite Reliability (CR) values for all constructs ranged between .84 and .96, confirming exceptional construct stability.

Discriminant Validity

Discriminant validity was rigorously evaluated using the Fornell-Larcker criterion and pairwise latent factor correlation analysis:

• The square root of the AVE for every individual construct was strictly greater than any inter-construct correlation ($\sqrt{ ext{AVE}} > r_{ij}$) across the correlation matrix.
• A series of nested CFA chi-square difference tests ($\Delta \chi^2$) comparing unconstrained models with models constraining factor correlations to unity ($1.0$) were all statistically significant ($p < .001$), confirming that the seven subscales represent distinct latent theoretical constructs.
• Critically, SG Personal Disappointment demonstrated empirical distinctiveness from SG Negative Mood Reduction ($r = .64$) and SG Therapeutic Motivation ($r = .68$), substantiating Mortimer et al.'s hypothesis that acute, situational disappointment is psychometrically separate from chronic mood repair.

Nomological and Criterion Validity

Nomological validity was verified by linking the SGCBS dimensions within a structural equation model to established consumer behavioral antecedents and outcomes, such as generalized self-esteem, chronic stress, hedonism, and purchase frequency. Positive mood reinforcement strongly predicted hedonic shopping frequency, while therapeutic motivation and personal disappointment were strongly predicted by consumer stress indices and compensatory shopping patterns.

Reliability

The SGCBS displays internal consistency across all subscales, validated across multiple independent consumer cohorts. Both Cronbach's alpha ($lpha$) and Composite Reliability ($
ho_c$) metrics demonstrate that the scale is free of measurement error:

Subscale Internal Consistency (Mortimer et al., 2015)

• SG Reward: $lpha = .935$; $ ext{CR} = .936$ (4 items)
• SG Personal Disappointment: $lpha = .930$; $ ext{CR} = .931$ (3 items)
• SG Celebratory: $lpha = .882$; $ ext{CR} = .884$ (3 items)
• SG Therapeutic Motivation: $lpha = .964$; $ ext{CR} = .964$ (4 items)
• SG Negative Mood Reduction: $lpha = .960$; $ ext{CR} = .960$ (3 items)
• SG Positive Mood Reinforcement: $lpha = .918$; $ ext{CR} = .919$ (4 items)
• SG Hedonic: $lpha = .836$; $ ext{CR} = .841$ (4 items)

Every subscale comfortably exceeds the conventional psychometric benchmark of $lpha ge .70$ for exploratory research and $lpha ge .80$ for standardized diagnostic application. Corrected item-total correlations across all 25 items exceeded .65, indicating that each item makes an independent contribution to its intended latent dimension. Test-retest reliability across a four-week interval in an auxiliary validation subgroup confirmed temporal stability, with intra-class correlation coefficients ($ICC$) exceeding .82 across all dimensions.

Factor Analysis

The underlying factor structure of the SGCBS was refined and confirmed through a rigorous two-phase analytical process comprising Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) followed by multi-sample Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA):

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

During the initial calibration phase ($N = 407$), the 31 purified items were subjected to principal axis factoring with oblique (Promax) rotation, reflecting the theoretical expectation that self-gifting motivational dimensions are mutually correlated. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy was .94, and Bartlett's test of sphericity was highly significant ($\chi^2(465) = 9842.16, p < .001$). Inspection of the scree plot and eigenvalues ($> 1.0$) converged on a clean seven-factor solution. Six items exhibiting cross-loadings greater than .30 or communalities below .50 were eliminated, yielding the final 25-item structure, which accounted for $78.4%$ of the total variance.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

The 25-item, seven-factor measurement model was subsequently tested using maximum likelihood CFA on an independent validation sample ($N = 405$). The first-order seven-factor oblique model demonstrated fit across standard fit indices:

• Chi-Square / Degrees of Freedom ($\chi^2 / df$): $612.45 / 254 = 2.41$ (below the conservative threshold of 3.0)
• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): $.965$ (exceeding the $ge .95$ benchmark for excellent fit)
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): $.958$ (exceeding the $ge .95$ benchmark)
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): $.059$ ($90%\text{ CI } [.053, .065]$; well below the $.08$ cutoff)
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): $.041$ (below the $.05$ threshold)

Competing structural models—including a one-factor unidimensional model ($\chi^2 / df = 14.82, ext{CFI} = .52, ext{RMSEA} = .185$) and a second-order general self-gifting model—were systematically evaluated. The first-order correlated seven-factor model exhibited superior statistical fit and informational parsimony (lowest AIC and BIC), confirming that self-gifting is best represented as a constellation of distinct, inter-correlated motivational drivers rather than a single monolithic disposition.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Instrument Name: Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale (SGCBS)
• Authors: Gary Mortimer, Ursula S. Bougoure, and Syed Fazal-E-Hasan
• Publication Year: 2015
• Construct Assessed: Motivations driving self-directed gift-giving consumption across affective, reward, celebratory, and hedonic domains
• Target Population: Adult consumers (applicable across cross-cultural, retail, and clinical consumer samples)
• Administration Format: Self-report questionnaire (paper-and-pencil, computer-assisted, or online survey)
• Administration Time: Approximately 5 to 8 minutes
• Number of Items: 25 items
• Response Scale: 7-point Likert scale (1 = Strongly disagree, 2 = Disagree, 3 = Somewhat disagree, 4 = Neither agree nor disagree, 5 = Somewhat agree, 6 = Agree, 7 = Strongly agree)
• Subscale Breakdown:
  • SG Reward: Items 1, 2, 3, 4 (4 items)
  • SG Personal Disappointment: Items 5, 6, 7 (3 items)
  • SG Celebratory: Items 8, 9, 10 (3 items; Item 8 is reverse-scored)
  • SG Therapeutic Motivation: Items 11, 12, 13, 14 (4 items; Item 13 is reverse-scored)
  • SG Hedonic: Items 15, 16, 17, 18 (4 items)
  • SG Positive Mood Reinforcement: Items 19, 20, 21, 22 (4 items)
  • SG Negative Mood Reduction: Items 23, 24, 25 (3 items)
• Scoring Procedures:
  • Step 1 (Reverse Scoring): Invert the scores for negatively worded items: Item 8 and Item 13. For a 7-point scale, the transformation formula is: $\text{New Score} = 8 – \text{Original Score}$ ($1 to 7, 2 to 6, 3 to 5, 4 to 4, 5 to 3, 6 to 2, 7 to 1$).
  • Step 2 (Subscale Scoring): Calculate the arithmetic mean or sum of the items assigned to each subscale. Utilizing subscale mean scores preserves the interpretable 1–7 metric.
  • Step 3 (Interpretation): Higher subscale scores reflect greater salience of that specific psychological motivation in prompting self-gifting decisions. The SGCBS is designed as a multidimensional profile rather than a combined global sum, though a composite self-gifting index may be computed for generalized exploratory modeling.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour Scale (SGCBS) was published in 2015 in the peer-reviewed academic journal Journal of Consumer Behaviour. The instrument and its psychometric validation are copyrighted by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and the original authors (Mortimer, Bougoure, & Fazal-E-Hasan).

The scale items are published openly within the original validation study for academic, scholarly, and non-commercial educational research purposes. Academic researchers and non-profit institutions may utilize the SGCBS without royalty fees, provided full bibliographic citation and attribution are accorded to Mortimer, Bougoure, and Fazal-E-Hasan (2015). For commercial applications, diagnostic battery inclusion, or marketing consultancy deployments, permission should be secured from the copyright holder (John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.) and the corresponding author, Professor Gary Mortimer (Queensland University of Technology).

References

• Bandura, A. (1976). Self-reinforcement: Theoretical and empirical challenges. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 1(4), 193–215. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01663994
• Churchill, G. A. (1979). A paradigm for developing better measures of marketing constructs. Journal of Marketing Research, 16(1), 64–73. https://doi.org/10.1177/002224377901600110
• Fornell, C., & Larcker, D. F. (1981). Evaluating structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error. Journal of Marketing Research, 18(1), 39–50. https://doi.org/10.1177/002224378101800104
• Gronmo, S. (1988). Compensatory consumer behaviour: Elements of a critical theory of consumption. In P. Otnes (Ed.), The Sociology of Consumption (pp. 65–85). Solum Forlag.
• Gross, J. J. (1998). The emerging field of emotion regulation: An integrative review. Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 271–299. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.2.3.271
• Larsen, R. J. (2000). Toward a science of mood regulation. Psychological Inquiry, 11(3), 129–141. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327965PLI1103_01
• Mick, D. G., & DeMoss, M. (1990a). Self-gifts: Phenomenological insights from four contexts. Journal of Consumer Research, 17(3), 322–332. https://doi.org/10.1086/208560
• Mick, D. G., & DeMoss, M. (1990b). To me from me: A descriptive approach to self-gifts. Advances in Consumer Research, 17, 677–682.
• Mortimer, G., Bougoure, U. S., & Fazal-E-Hasan, S. (2015). Development and validation of the Self-Gifting Consumer Behaviour scale. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 14(3), 165–179. https://doi.org/10.1002/cb.1508
• Rucker, D. D., & Galinsky, A. D. (2008). Desire to acquire: Powerlessness and compensatory consumption. Journal of Consumer Research, 35(2), 257–267. https://doi.org/10.1086/588569

Items of the Scale